The Good and the Bad

What Puts You on That Ledge

Chapter Fifty-Five

*~*~*~*

"I'm just saying, we need to come up with a better system." Antonio said as he and Scout climbed the stairs to Intelligence. The duo running a few minutes late thanks to a particularly hectic morning at home with all four kids.

"A better system?" Scout couldn't help but chuckle at his word choice. "We've got four kids, Antonio. We can try however many systems you can come up with, but none of them are gonna work as well as you want them to. That's called parenthood."

"Do we wanna know what happened this morning?" Kevin raised a brow at the couple, he and Adam having overheard their conversation.

"Eva hogged the kids' bathroom for over an hour this morning," Antonio clued the other men in as he took a seat at his desk.

"Isn't she eleven? Why does she need to be in there that long?" Adam frowned.

"She's thirteen," Scout corrected him. "And more importantly, she's a thirteen-year-old girl. Unlike you guys at her age, she actually cares what she looks like. You need to cut her a break."

"I think we already do enough of that. The only chores we've given her and Diego are cleaning up after themselves and helping with DJ and Mackie," Antonio rolled his eyes. "You realize that this was their second time at the house in the month we've been living there?"

"I know," Scout assured him. "And that's something you can talk about with Laura. But it's got nothing to do with your daughter wanting to act like a typical teenage girl. Cut her some slack."

"Hey, Sarge." Adam cleared his throat when he spotted Voight standing in the doorway of his office. Both he and Kevin taking the chance to approach the other man. "So either Kev or I have to go to a training course for the new Penlink software, right?"

"Uh-huh. What's Penlink?" Voight asked.

"It's the-- Uh, we don't know," Kevin was honest with him.

"Which conveniently brings us to our point," Adam continued. "Respectfully, I know things didn't work out with Jin."

"Thin ice, Pup. Tread carefully." Scout warned from her desk, all of them about see the woman bristling at the mention of her late friend.

"You got some trust issues with the tech position, but I went to maybe three computer courses at the academy." Adam was honest with the sergeant.

"I mean, if you need to mic somebody or hook up an Xbox, I think we're your guys." Kevin added on.

"We're just not really cut out for the high-altitude stuff, boss," Adam finished up.

"Don't say another word," Jay raised a hand to catch their attention. "I got the perfect guy for that. He did the explosives case with us last year. Mouse, you remember him?"

"I remember everything, Jay." Voight spoke bluntly with the younger man.

"All right. Well, then you'll recall that he did a great job for us, and when O gets here, he and Scout'll tell you that too." Jay glanced towards the woman for backup.

"I'm here," Olinsky wheeled his chair out from behind the filing cabinets beside his desk. "Yeah, he was solid."

"Wasn't he the one that tried hitting on me?" Scout recalled the rather homely looking man that she and Jay had met up with-- and how he'd polished off her fries.

"What?" Antonio's brows furrowed at the mention of someone hitting on his girlfriend, even if it had been a year ago.

"Yeah," Jay cleared his throat before moving on. "Plus, he's, like, a total tech whiz, you know, and I would trust him with my life. In fact, I have...many times."